Perfect Timing
by starwanker
Summary: Geppetto's thoughts about losing Pinocchio after the wash up on the beach. Happy ending: Fluff, but who doesn't like a good fluff fest?


_modern family is so funny. been watching that ALL week in me pjs cause of the unwelcomed snow. who ever heard of snow at the beach? but because of my asocial nature (i havent seen a human in what? three days? God help me) and general fatness towards life (ive literally down like three boxes of cheezits), ive been writing like crazy._

_i wanted to take a break from my baby, 'The Reality of Wonderland', and so i wrote this lil diddy out of boredom, and after being completely cuted by a similar story (Geppettos Longing by CentuarGirl) and rewatching my pinocchio dvd (yeah, for christmas. i asked for it. im 22, hop off!), so, w/o further ado..._

_enjoy (meaning read and review? yeah, yeah i think so)_

_critiques much obliged_

* * *

I was too late. I had always been too late, since the day I sent him off to school. He never came home.

So, like any good father, who loves his child, I went out to search for him the in the cold, stormy night. What could've happened to him? Where could he be? I was worried sick over my lost, little puppet, and so, like any kind, loving, concerned father, who missed his only child, I searched all over the village. And further into the country side. Down by the coast. And finally, I set out to sea to look for my Pinocchio.

But I was stopped.

Swallowed, to be precise.

By a whale.

Monstro.

I was swallowed, ship and all, by a beast, a goliath named Monstro, Monstro the whale. I sat in the deep, dark, murky depths of his stomach, my ship jammed between two massive ribs, floating in the brackish bile of seawater and stomach acid.

But I was found.

_He_ found me.

My sweet, brave little creation had somehow managed to find me. Reunited with my Pinocchio, I was at peace, at rest, perfectly content to endure the rest of our happy days together inside the belly of a beast. However, this was not so with Pinocchio. Ingenuity I had not, Pinocchio devised a plan to smoke our way out of Monstro, and we did just that.

Out through his mouth we flew! Thrust forward into the angry sea by a sneeze, we sailed onward towards a distant, rocky island. But we were not fast enough.

Monstro was angry.

He wanted revenge.

He smashed our tiny, fragile raft into driftwood and debris, leaving me to drown in the raging sea as my strength seeped from my bones. I told him to swim to shore. I told the only thing that mattered to _make it to shore_.

Pinocchio never listened to his father. He was a good boy, but a mischievous boy, and moreover _not_ a good listener.

I was awoken by the soft, static sound of foamy waves, gently pummeling over each other into the sand, one after another.

I sat up, drowsy and water logged, forgetting where I was.

It was a beach, a cove surrounded by salty, aged rocks and mounds. There were small wave pools forming constantly by the shore, were the waves from the stormy sea were filtered and calmed into the outlet. I surveyed the area briefly, still at a loss as to where I was. And why. Then I saw it. I saw the one and only thing a parent never wants to see, the most indescribable, deep gutted, retching, twisted, cruel, unfair, turn of fate: the sight of my son, face down in one of the countless wave pools.

Dead.

He wanted revenge. He smashed my tiny, fragile doll into driftwood and debris, leaving me to drown in my bitter tears as my strength seeped from my soul.

He was never a good listener.

But he had always been brave.

I was too late. I had always been too late, since the day I picked up that beautifully grained log of pine, and brought my chisel to it's bark. Too late.

Could I have switched places with him, I would have. But I new I couldn't. I had one miracle too many, and I lost it. If only I wasn't an old, feeble man, if only I were strong, if only I weren't too late, maybe I could've saved his life. Maybe I could've brought him to shore, safely on my shoulders as I swam for the both of us. Like any good father would've, who loves his child. Like any kind, loving, concerned father would've, who _missed_ his _only child!_

I behold my lifeless marionette as his body rested on my bed.

"My boy. My brave, little boy." I let out, collapsing into tears as I buried my head into my arms. I couldn't bear to look any longer. It _hurt._ It hurt so much, so deep, that I began to hear his voice. I smiled, almost, as Pinocchio's faraway cry rang in my head.

_Father? Whatcha crying for?_

How bitter fate had been, to deal me such a hand then plague me with guilt, with memories, ghost, loneliness, insanity!

"Because, Pinocchio; you're dead."

_No I'm not._

"Yes, yes you are, no lay back down." He had never been a good listener. Maybe he got it from me. My mind, my heart, my soul went into that puppet, and I refused to believe he was truly gone.

_But father, I'm alive!_

This echo caused me to look up. He sounded so close, so real.

"And-and, I'm real." I looked to see the animated corpse of my beloved son, a living ghost made not of pine, but flesh and warmth. I could only gape. Could I have such a vivid, menacing imagination? Had I lost my sanity so quickly? "I'm a real boy father!"

And then it hit me. It hit me like Monstro's massive tail fin hit our make shift raft: he _was_ real. _He _was real. He was _real!_ My son, my begotten, precious son, lost to the world sat up and looked me in the eye with more life in his electric blue pupils than I had ever seen. _He was real_. And he was alive. And he was mine!

"My son! You're real!"

"I'm a real boy!" He cried as I scooped him from the bed and tossed him in the air.

I wasn't too late. In fact, I'd say I had nothing to do with it.

Fate has prefect timing.


End file.
